Thursday, July 02, 2009

Via Digby I think Senator Bernie Sanders has hit on the right question with regards to what form health care reform takes in the senate---

So I think, with all due respect to Max and his hard work, it's the wrong strategy. I think the strategy should be to say to all 60 members of the Democratic caucus that even if you don't want a public plan in the final bill, you should commit to ending the Republican filibuster. You don't need 60 votes to pass legislation. You need 60 votes to end the filibuster. And if we do that, we can get a strong public plan that will be real change.

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Look, the Democrats said give us 60 votes so we can come up with something. They gave it to us! I'm not a Democrat, I'm an Independent, but I caucus with the Democrats. They gave us 60 votes. So how many do we need? Seventy? Eighty? I understand that there are some Democrats, without ascribing motives, who are not comfortable voting for a strong public plan period. But I think it is not asking too much that they vote against the Republican filibuster.

We need to stop asking pinheads like Lieberman or Nelson whether they prefer the public option, full on single payer or the do nothing solution all the senate "moderates" seem to be leaning towards. Their answers are as empty as their souls. If they're going to vote against the final health care reform bill because they remain industry whores that's their choice.

The real question is how they'll vote on cloture, not what sort of health care reform they'll support. That's how we're going to seperate the men from the boys. Or as in this case the men from the spineless weasels.